How do passive spells work on pets?

[linkfire12]

I am wondering what spells work on pets, and what functions. If I was to give my pet animal handling, would it only increase the power of their summons, or would their damage increase as well? Can you stack it on both you and your pet to double the effects? Does armour expertise increase a pets defence? Can you stack magic find?

Other than that, I'm trying to figure out the best spells to use for both me and my pet, at the moment I have a preference for passives and haste, and from what I hear people say putting summons on pets seems useful, but I'm not sure. The cooldown for pet abilities is immensely long, and I'm wondering if passives to increase the pets abilities themselves would be smarter and more efficient, but I'm not sure what spells actually work.

[steffire3]

It's usually more efficient to have Passives on Player and Summons on Pet although it can be reversed as it's a matter of having either the Player or Pet being in charge of activating the Minions. It's up to the Player to decide which play-style they prefer.

[linkfire12]

I'm mostly wondering what passive spells actually work on pets, I'm having trouble telling.
My pet has a higher auto attack dps, which makes their summons much more effective as of right now, but according to the wiki, the cooldown is twice as long, but Heal All 2 on me, and Heal All 3 on my pet both had a thirty second cooldown, so I can't tell.

Animal Handling seems to reduce shopping times when it is on the pet, but I can't tell if their damage increased.

[steffire3]

Might be better by equipping Skulls on Player that increase Pet / Minion Damage for the Pet Dps increase and equip Summons on the Pet as well.

[HiFive]

Originally posted by linkfire12:

I'm mostly wondering what passive spells actually work on pets, I'm having trouble telling.
My pet has a higher auto attack dps, which makes their summons much more effective as of right now, but according to the wiki, the cooldown is twice as long, but Heal All 2 on me, and Heal All 3 on my pet both had a thirty second cooldown, so I can't tell.

Animal Handling seems to reduce shopping times when it is on the pet, but I can't tell if their damage increased.

I always put animal handling on my character, because I often have minions of my own. It probably reduces shopping time regardless of who it's on. Archers and Zombies and Nether Imps are good summons for pets, but they do have a longer cooldown. Skeleton is a better summons for your character, since you can then summon multiple skeletons (I think up to 5). Your pet will only summon one skeleton at a time. For shorter cooldowns, your pet can use Fireball, Frost, Haste. Fireball and Frost don't work well on my character, since I can't aim them as well as my pet, unlesss..... I'm fighting a boss. Heal All can be used on your pet, but he'll just do it in the spell order he has, and only when he has enough mana - not always when you need it.

Re: Spell order on your pet. Your pet will cast spells in the order they are placed on his spell chart. He does not do them according to what is needed at the moment. He does whatever is next on the list that he has enough mana for. So, if you put Fireball first, that is the first attack he will always use. If you put skeletons next, he will always follow up with skeletons if he has enough mana. If he doesn't, he will use the next spell. It works sort of like a combo attack skill.

Passives for weapons and shields will not, of course, work on pets, since they don't have weapons. I usually use the passives (Tomes) for my character and use the spells for my pet, although I will often give myself the archers and skeletons as well. (Two sets of archers!)

Also, I'm pretty sure you can use the same level of the same spells on yourself and your pet. So you can use Heal All 3 for yourself and also give your pet the Heal All 3.

[linkfire12]

Thank you for the info, so pets cooldown is doubled? It doesn't seem to be on Heal All. Any clue if animal handling boosts pet dmg if it is on the pet?

What I'm most curious about is if magic/gold find and xp boost work on pet, and if they can stack if you put one on you as well.

"Edit" According to the wiki, only the summons (other than Nether Imp) get increased cooldowns on pets. But I have yet to find out if Adventurer, Animal Handling, Treasure Hunter and Armour Expertise work on pets, I would really like to know that.

[HiFive]

Originally posted by linkfire12:

Thank you for the info, so pets cooldown is doubled? It doesn't seem to be on Heal All. Any clue if animal handling boosts pet dmg if it is on the pet?

What I'm most curious about is if magic/gold find and xp boost work on pet, and if they can stack if you put one on you as well.

"Edit" According to the wiki, only the summons (other than Nether Imp) get increased cooldowns on pets. But I have yet to find out if Adventurer, Animal Handling, Treasure Hunter and Armour Expertise work on pets, I would really like to know that.

Once you equip the Tome for Animal Handling it will tell you what percentage damage and armor increase your pet will get. I just checked - when equipped on my pet, there is no change in his armor or damage stats. When I equip it on my character, his armor and damage stats are increased. I think equipping that Tome on him might help boost his own minions, but it doesn't seem to boost him. I equip the Animal Handling Tome on my character to boost my pet's stats and my minion's stats.

As far as what I have observed, it seems that gold find and xp boosts, fame boosts and magic find work for your character whether they are equipped on you or on your pet. Your pet is basically an extension of your character in this regard. Yes, whichever of these is on your pet will stack with what is on your character as well.

Okay, I just checked the Armor Expertise Tome on my pet, and it does show his physical armor being increased when the Tome is equipped on him.

I checked the Treasure Hunter Tome as well. My Arcane Statistics page does not show an increase in gold find or magic find when the Tome is on my pet. However, back when I played the vanilla game, I always seemed to get more gold and magic, xp, fame, etc. whenever such Tomes or stats were equipped on my pet, so either I remember wrong or the Arcane Statistics page just doesn't include that information. In other words, the Arcane Statistics are probably only telling you what is on your character, and not what is on your pet, even though what your pet is getting is affecting your character. Your pet gets the extra gold and magic find, but your character gets to pick it up. The same with xp - your pet gets the extra elites and monsters, but you both get the same gains from killing them. That would seem to confirm that these benefits will stack if they are equipped on both your character and your pet.

I also checked the cooldowns of the spells on my pet. His archers and other spells have the same cooldown listed as what my character has. Maybe the Wiki information is old, and this was something that was changed in a later patch, or maybe the mod I am using changed it. However, I have never noticed my pet taking longer to summon archers. I just did a test run with my pet and my stopwatch said he took exactly 30 seconds to summon a 2nd set of archers. Again, I'm playing with a mod pack at the moment. I haven't tested any of this on the vanilla game.

[linkfire12]

Thank you so much for figuring it out, it's great to have some clarification. My pets archer cooldown is 60 seconds, (but like I said, only summons excluding the Imp have it, so it's not a huge deal). Some web searching states that a dev (on the now unreadable forums), stated that Treasure Hunter on your pet stacks with you, and just doesn't show on the statistics, so your experience seems accurate.

I suspected Armour Mastery would work since the Pets equipment is classified as such (whether it is worth doing is a different question). I greatly appreciate you checking.